


True Identity

by InvisibleBookReader



Category: Banana Bus Squad
Genre: Banana Bus Squad - Freeform, Bullying, Child Abuse, Enemies to Friends, Enemies to Friends to Lovers, Enemies to Lovers, Gaming, Homophobia, M/M, Mask, Past Child Abuse, Peer Pressure, Scars, Self-Harm, Slow Burn, YouTube, Youtuber RPF - Freeform, hidden identity
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-05-14
Updated: 2017-03-13
Packaged: 2018-06-08 07:19:35
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 14
Words: 19,801
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6844639
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/InvisibleBookReader/pseuds/InvisibleBookReader
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Jonathan Smith, the scarred boy from North Carolina. After him and his mother escape from his father's abusive clutches, they run away to Canada where he will not find them. Jon is enrolled in the local school as a senior.</p><p>Evan Fong, the resident bad boy. Everyone either worships the ground he walks on or loathes his guts. He's a softie at heart, but has 'friends' who are constantly peer pressuring him into being someone he's not. </p><p>Jonathan finds his online friend Vanoss at this school, and discovers that he's not all sunshine and rainbows. </p><p>Evan doesn't want to bully the new kid, he has an uncanny resemblance to an old friend of his...</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter One

**Author's Note:**

> Disclaimer:  
> This is a work of fiction and any resemblances to people in real life are pure coincidence. I do not own the characters, besides the original characters. 
> 
> I am currently editing and rewriting this book, and have only edited chapter one at this moment.

Disclaimer:  
This is a work of fiction and any resemblances to people in real life are pure coincidence. I do not own the characters, except the original characters. The cover image is not mine.

 

The cold winds of Canada hit Jonathan's scarred face as he stood, waiting for the bus to take me to my new school. The wind pushes his shaggy brown hair down in front of his bright blue eyes. He pushes his hair out of his face, revealing the three huge scars. The first one runs down the left side of Jon's face, from the temple to the chin. The next runs from the top of his right eye, over his nose and ending in the middle of his left cheek. The last is a small scar a couple of centimetres above his right eyebrow, disappearing into his hairline.

Jonathan's father gave him those scars three days after his tenth birthday. Most of the time he wasn't home. He was out sleeping around, but when he was home he was either drinking or hitting Jonathan's mother or himself. Or, unfortunately, sometimes both. Jon's dad went missing late last year, as a result, him and his mother moved up to Canada for a fresh start.

Jon's best friend, Evan, doesn't know he's residing in Canada, and Jon prefers to keep it that way. He doesn't want Evan to see his hideous face. Jon used to be called scarface and goblin at his old school. He knows what Evan looks like, based from long nights of gaming together, and next to him, Jon sees himself as a pile of shit. Evan's chocolate brown eyes can attract the attention of anyone, his jet black hair gleams in the sun, and it's all tied together with huge muscles and a beautiful smile. Not to mention his down-to-earth personality and his ability to make anyone laugh. As you now know, Jonathan is gay, and he may have a slight crush on his best friend. Actually, make that a huge crush.

The rickety, old bus finally arrived, spluttering out fumes from the back. Jon's reflection shows on the headlight, a tall, scrawny 17 year old in a blue hoodie and black skinny jeans. Even on the bus Jon can tell this is a school divided by cliques. He notices all the different types of people, jocks, cheerleaders, emos, nerds, preps, and lesser groups.

Jon spots a spare seat, next to a boy with a red jacket and black jeans. His black hair is all spiked up. He's talking to someone in front of him, another boy their age with striking green eyes and fair skin.

"Excuse me?" Jon asks. 

The boy turns to face Jon, spitting out, "What do you want?" Jon stood there, mouth hanging open in shock, how rude! It didn't hit him straight away, but then Jon recognises the accent and straight jawline from late nights playing games with 'The Banana Bus Crew'. They are even thinking of starting their own youtube channel soon. It's Evan. And he is looking hella fine.

"Um, is this seat taken?" Jon stutters out after an embarrassingly long amount of time.

"Whatever. Sit there if you want to." He replies, rolling his eyes. Jon quickly sits down just before the bus took off, saving him from flying down the bus. Evan continues talking in hushed whispers to the boys in front of him. What's go his knickers in a knot? He's not the type to just go around being rude to 'strangers'. 

Over the rest of the ride, Jon steals glances at the boy seated next to him. Sure enough, he notices. His cheeks go red.

"What are you looking at?" He asks in a rude manner. He averts his eyes to the aisle floor. It doesn't quell Evan's anger though.

"Answer me when I'm talking to you!" He shouts. Jon looks him in the face, Evan looks back at Jon with disgust, how dare a weakling of a man sit next to him and ogle him shamelessly?

"S-sorry," Jon stutters hopelessly. Stop stuttering. Why was he treating him like this? Is it because of his scars? His face? His body? His lack of self esteem? 

The bus jerks forward, sending Jon flying into the padded seat in front of him, as they pull up at the school, grinding to a halt. Evan pushes Jonathan out of his seat, he wasn't prepared for the shove and fell over into the aisle of the bus. Jon quickly regained his stance, dusts himself off and rushes out of the bus.

"I'll think I'll be seeing more of you around, I didn't catch your name," Evan doesn't phrase it like a question, but Jon knows exactly that it is.

 

"My name's Jonathan, and I don't want to be called anything less," he finishes, holding his head high as he says it. He's H20Delirious, but Evan doesn't need to know that. He doesn't need to know he's friends with a scarred freak. 

"Sure thing, see you later," he finishes, but the green eyed boy from the bus calls out "Scarface!" to add to the end of the statement. Fuck.

Maybe he might properly stand up to them, him, the next time he sees them. Out of the entirety of Canada, Jon happened to be going to his school. Perfect.


	2. Chapter Two

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hi everyone! For the clarification Evan and Jonathon are both 18 and in their last year of high school. I don't know much about the Canadian education system so if anything doesn't really fit just pretend it does.
> 
> Until next time!

Even though the buses are an absolute pile of steaming shit, the school is very posh and fancy. White house fancy. Too fancy for Jonathan's liking. The front of the school is dominated by huge, white buildings with tinted windows. Neatly trimmed, green bushes hide behind the curly, bronze fences. The gate is what Jon pictures the pearly gates to look like. Huge. The main office screams 'professional business' not 'pretentious highschool'. Seriously, it doesn't hurt to tone it down a bit. 

 

A chic lady dressed in a sophisticated black dress sits behind the desk, typing away on her, surprisingly, outdated computer. Jon clears his throat loudly to grab her attention. Her head whips up, her name tag reads 'Lucy'. 

 

"Welcome to Crosswell Secondary Collage, how may I help you?" Her voice is too cheerful for this time of the morning. 

 

"Hi, my name's Jonathan Smith and I was told I need to come to the office to receive my timetable." Wow, this school is already influencing Jon. He never speaks with that type of vocabulary. 

 

"Ah! Yes, you're the new kid from North Carolina, right? It's great to meet you!" Her posh facade melts away, leaving a bubbly young girl, fresh out of collage. She sticks her tiny hand over the counter, waiting for Jon to shake it. He does. Her hands are soft. The printer buzzes, ejecting his new timetable.

"You must be quite the hotshot to get in these subjects. Congrats." She passes Jon the piece of paper, then sees what she was talking about. Advanced subjects, sweet, Evan told him that he's in the advanced subjects one night when he was feeling particularly giddy. Alcohol, maybe? Who knows what those boys have gotten him into. He thanks the lady and start walking towards locker bay D. 

"Haha, the D," Jon mutters to himself, lightly chuckling as his feet thump against the pavement.

The lockers aren't kept very well. There's rubbish everywhere, the floorboards are rotting and the roof looks like it's going to cave in. Jon ignores the rancid smell of rotting food and finds his locker, D420. What are the odds? He shoves his black bag into his locker, and before he has time to lock it, his phone rings. The caller I.D. says it's him. Jon's ringtone plays super loud, causing a couple of people to turn their heads to the source of the obnoxious noise. Jon answers it quicker than a flash, and walk away to a more private area.

"Hello? Del?" Evan asks, his honey sweet voice melting Jon's insides to goop. 

"Evan! What's up? Why are you calling? I'm at school," Jon replies, trying to sound busier than he truely is. He just doesn't want Evan to turn a corner and find Jon standing there talking to him. That would be...awkward.

"No reason. Except that Tyler told me you moved. Where did you move to?" Evan pounces on him. Oh no...oh no, oh no, this is bad. Extremely bad. Shit.

"It's a surprise motherfucker!" Jon exclaims, laughing. Evan laughs alongside Jon. God, that sweet laugh has Jon falling for him all over again.

"Ok, whatever you say Delirious. But, if it's a surprise, does than mean I can finally meet you in real life?" Jon was about to answer 'no', but he heard Evan coming around the corner. FUCK!

"Nope! Gotta go, bye!" Jon rushes out, hangs up and slams the phone back into his denim pocket. He runs back to his locker to see Evan turning the corner out of his peripheral vision.

Jon gets back to his locker to find all his stuff sprawled across the flooring. The gross, revolting flooring. Shit, he forgot to lock it. Jon drops to the floor and stacks all the books in his locker upright, the way he previously had them arranged. He lifts more of them up and was about to put them in when someone knocked them out of his hands, spewing them everywhere.

"Hey Jonny, you're in the way of my locker," Evan elbows him, and sends him toppling over. What the actual fuck?

"You could say please next time," Jon speaks up so he can hear me. He locks his icing eyes with Evan's menacing ones, there was a hint of regret deep in his eyes that Jonathan almost missed. Jon hopes he never sees Evan's eyes that angry yet that distraught ever again.

***

What did he just say? Evan looks down at the boy sitting on the ground, glaring right up at him with his piercing blue eyes. Evan takes a deep breath. This kid is surprisingly defiant, and Evan admires that, but he's a little ticked off. Evan is known at this school for having a short temper, his handsome looks and beating people up if they mess with him, but it's peer pressure. Anyone who really knows Evan knows that he is a really sweet guy who has been trapped in a vortex of bullshit by his supposed friends. Evan just didn't want to fall victim to his "friends" beliefs of weeding out the weak and making them suffer. Maybe the new kid can be a changing point in his life.

He stands up, not breaking eye contact. Evan's friends are standing behind him, making the universally know punching symbol. Evans knows he has to do it, which is a shame. Evan thinks if this guy held his head higher he might even be attractive, in a weird way Evan doesn't want to think about. Evan sighs and punches him, catching him off guard. He goes flying back, hitting his head on the wall behind him. He opens his bright eyes, and spits blood to the floor.

"What's your problem?" He throws his arms up, still glaring at Evan. He walks over to the new kid, lifts him up by his collar and pushes him against the wall. Maybe this is a bit over the top...

"My problem will be you if you keep this attitude up," Evan snarls, knowing the excess aggression will earn browny points with his friends. Evan releases him, his legs give out making fall down again. Evan reluctantly leaves him there, grabs his books and heads off to the first class. Evan's friends pat him on the back, congratulating him on my offenses.

All that is on Evan's mind are his stunning eyes.

'No, I can't be thinking like that. Oh, yes I can. Ok, he's hot, so what? Is there a problem with that? Straight jawline (I hope isn't like him), blue eyes that stare into your soul, small nose, tan skin, and to top it off, a willowly body. The scars make him look manlier I guess, I don't know why we called him that awful name, 'scarface'. Everything just fits perfectly on him. I probably would to,' Evan silently debates as he enters the first class and slumps down into his chair.

Argh! Stupid brain.


	3. Chapter Three

Once the boys leave the lockers, whispers broke out across the bay. Jon averts his gaze to the ground, yeah the ground is looking rather interesting today. Jon stands up, dusts himself off, gathers what books he needs for class, and heads off. This time he didn't forget to lock the locker.

Jon spent close to ten minutes wandering around the school, the bell having rung ages ago. He has no idea where to go! He doesn't recognise where any of the rooms are. His timetable says that Jon has science in room 18. He wanders a bit more until he finds room 16. Aha! Room 17... room 18! Finally! He goes to open the old, wooden door, but stops. 

'Holy shit,' he thinks, 'I'm so late. On my first day as well. I'm hoping the teacher can excuse me, I have a valid reason!'

Jonathan's phone went off, playing the text tone. The delirious outta my mind one. At full volume. I-I'm del- he shuts the damn thing off at the speed of light. The class inside goes silent. Jon slowly reaches to turn the rusty handle and enter, making a note to not look at anyone's faces, poorly suppressing laughter. 

The teacher glares at him. He has grey hair, balding on the top, grey eyes and an extremely wrinkled face. He's about Lui's height. Ha, he sort of looks like the old men in Gmod. His name tag say Mr. Cooper on it, next to the school logo, a raven perched on a branch. He clears his throat and furrows his bushy eyebrows.

"About time Mr. Smith, is it?" He snaps at Jon. He nods, staring at the ground, awkwardly shuffling his feet.

"Sorry, got lost, sir," Jon replies, loud enough so Cooper's old ears can hear him. His frown disappears, replaced by a smile, making his face younger, but still covered in wrinkles.

"Well that's expected on your first day! Class, this is Jonathon. Jonathon, tell us about yourself," Mr. Cooper says with a sudden mood swing. Jon looks out towards the class. He spots Evan smirking at him in the back. Jon had an inkling he'd be in the same classes, he's one smart cookie.

"Well, I just moved here from the USA last week. I can breathe and walk. That's all there is to it with me," Jon explains. Half the class groans and the other half snickers.

"What about your interests?" Mr. Cooper asks him, determined for a better response this time. Jon decides he's not going to give him a better one.

"I like oxygen, being able to breathe is great," he says, the class starts laughing. Despite his overly fake, nice demeanour, the class must despise him enough to laugh at Jon's shitty jokes, which only further disrupts the class.

"Mr. Smith, please give me a proper answer," the teacher growls, starting to get cross with him.

"Ok, well I like working out, I guess," Jon mumbles, looking down, not knowing what else to say.

"Is that all?" The teacher drawls.

"Well, I like metal and dubstep music, hockey, guitar and running. Is that a better answer, sir?" Jon replies, putting emphasis on 'sir'. The teacher nods and tells me to go sit down. Mum always played heavy metal for Jon growing up, seeing his dad hated it. Dad also hates hockey, plus Evan plays it. Nogla got him into playing guitar. Jonathan got a lot of practice running when he was younger. Sadly, his dad was a faster runner.

Jon spots a spare seat, right next to Evan. Yay, he gets a whole lesson of stirring Evan up, testing his limits. Yeah, that sounds mean, but Jon wants to know for future reference. Just incase of emergency.

***

Jonathan. What a nice name. Also belonging to Delirious. A.K.A Mr. Hilarious laugh, gorgeous personality and great gaming skills. Evan takes no notice of Jon as he sits next to him, Evan's thoughts are clouded with Delirious. He wishes Del would just tell him where he moved. He pulls out my phone and ask Delirious if he can talk. No reply.

Jon leans over to look at Evan's phone. What does he think he's doing?

"Who the fuck is Delirious?" He whispers.

"None of your business, scarface." Does he think this is a game? A facade Evan and the boys are pulling on him? Well, he wishes it was.

"Sorry, just asking about some idiot you know," he smirks.

"Take. That. Back. Now," Evan slowly demands. He shakes his head smugly. No, he's just doing this for fun. He's asking for it, that's what he's doing. He kicks Jon's shin under the table. He winces.

"I see that there's a heart next to their name as well. Care to explain? Got a widdle cwush?" Jon says. He doesn't know a thing. It's not a little crush, it's a huge one. Besides, Tyler made them both change the contacts so to any outsider it looks like we're gay for each other. But does he care? No!

"No I don't, scarface. It was a dare if you must know," Evan retorts. 

"Here I'll ask him for a screenshot." Evan texts Del asking for one.

***

Jon quickly turns his ringtone off after turning his phone back on. While Evan isn't looking, he screenshots the conversation and sends it to him with a 'now shut up and concentrate on your schoolwork, it's my first day I don't want to stuff up you motherfucker xD'. He turns off his phone and puts it away as Evan turns around to show him.

"There, thats proof. Now shut up and pay attention," Evan snaps. 

'Feisty Evan, me likey.' What the fuck brain? 

Jon tunes out for the rest of the lesson, not caring much for science. He's more into english and the arts to be honest.

After a long time the bell rings. He stands up, only to have Evan trip him over. A few people notice and laugh. Jon goes red and quickly gets up. He follows the class out of the room at the back of the crowd. P.E. Finally, but he has to get changed last. He doesn't want anyone to see his torn up back.

Jon stacks his books back into his locker, grabs his sports gear and tries to find the change rooms. After wandering around again he spots Evan going into the change rooms. He really needs to get a map or something.

He enters the room, and the scent hits him straight away. Sweat, b.o and axe spray. All waaaaaay too strong. Jon coughs a bit. He looks at the floor as he waits for everyone to finish changing. While he wasn't looking Evan shoves him out of the way of the door.

"Move it scarface," he growls. Jon huffs and walks to the other side of the room. Everyone eventually files out and once he checks no one is there he starts changing.

He quickly takes off his pants and put on some black shorts. He changes his shoes to black runners. He takes his shirt off, leaving his upper half naked. Jon looks down at his stomach, lean muscle with a scar running across it. His back has scars years old and some that didn't heal properly from last year. It still hurts if someone touches a massive scar running down the length of his back that was given to him as a departing gift two months ago.

Jon hears footsteps from behind him.

***

The teacher told Evan to go get Jon, seeing he's taking ages. He huffs as he walks into the change rooms.

"Hurry up-" Evan stops mid sentence. Jon's got his back facing Evan. Or what's left of his back. Countless scars run up and down, side to side on his back. He turns around, sees Evan and they both start going red.

"Piss off!" He yells at Evan and quickly chucks on a shirt. It never stopped Evan seeing his front though. Although he isn't muscled up like Evan, his lankiness is still attractive in it's own way. He has yet another scar diagonally across his stomach. Evan may as well start calling him scar now.

"Alright, hurry up Delirious," Evan chuckles. They both freeze. Wait, what the fuck. He's little old scarface not good old delirious.

"Again with this delirious person." He rolls his eyes, a chuckle escaping his plush pink lips.

"Sorry, you just remind me of someone," Evan replies. Jon frowns. They both exit the room and join our class.


	4. Chapter Four

The bell went, signalling lunch. Everyone rushes out of the maths classroom. Jon dawdles at the back of the group. The lessons have went pretty smoothly. In P.E he out ran the class in a 200 metre run, not to his surprise. He’s avoided Evan for most of the day after he saw him shirtless. The blush on his face just made the situation more awkward.

Jon shoves all of his heavy books back into locker 420. He moves away from the lockers with only his phone. Since Jon’s youth, he doesn’t usually eat at school, but usually at home instead. Jon walks around, trying to find a secluded spot to sit. The occasional crunch of leaves underneath his feet sound as he passes under some trees.

He eventually finds a spot to sit down, under a huge willow tree at the back of the not so strict school. The back of the classrooms are in his line of vision. All sorts of trees, green, red, brown, sprawl along the back of them, almost as if they are there to block the view of the football oval, which is in front of the tree Jon’s under.

His phone starts ringing. Jon restored the ringtone to it's former glory at the previous break. All he did in that break was go to the main office to get a map and other things to help him out around the school. If only they gave him pepper spray, that would be hilarious.

He looks at who's calling, it's Tyler. Jon answers. The rest of the crew is in the call as well. Including Vanoss.

"Um, hi? Why did you call me?" Jon asks Tyler hesitantly. He laughs.

"Just wanted to check up. P.S, everyone knows you moved,” Tyler laughs, then gets a serious tone in the second sentence. That little bitch!

"What?!" He shouts. Jon is furious, he only told Tyler because Tyler said he was in North Carolina for the week and wanted to visit him. He told Evan this morning because Evan called Jon to say Tyler told him.

"Yeah you little bitch! Are you gonna tell us where you moved to now?" Evan asks. Jon sighs, accepting his defeat.

"Canada,” he barely utters, but everyone heard him. Nogla whoops in the background.

"Finally H20Vanoss can sail!" He cheers. A few groans echo out, but a few more cheers do to.

"Shut up you dumb shit! That won't ever happen,” Terroriser laughs, you could almost hear the eye roll in his voice. Oh, but Jon hopes it does Brian, he hopes it does.

"Hey, Lui also moved to Ireland! He's currently living with me, much to his disgust. But it's hilarious having him around,” Nogla explains.

"Yeah, this dumb fuck spilt coffee all over me yesterday. I'll have to get my own place as soon as possible,” Lui explains, getting a laugh from the rest of it. "But really, I feel closer than ever,” he finishes in a sappy tone.

"Oh yeah, Evan and Jon are now officially in their last year of school. How's that going?" Craig asks. Everyone else is a year older than the two, having graduated last year.

"Oh, it's going good for me, I guess,” Jon says in a monotone. Yeah, besides getting punched in the face by his best friend, but they don't have to know about that.

"Well, um, that's good? And you Evan?" Craig says, with a hint of confusion.

"Well, there's this new kid at my school. He's got massive scars running down his face, so my friend's told me to call him scarface. In fact, he's got scars all over his body. I accidentally saw him shirtless earlier today..." Evan trails off. Jon fights the urge to burst out laughing. He sounds so embarrassed!

"Is he hot?" Brian asks. Everyone knew Brian was gay, he told them a couple of weeks ago. They were all accepting of him, but the amount of gay jokes has increased.

"Get your gay ass out of here Brian! But if you must know, yes, yes he is,” Evan chuckles. Jon shakes his head while smiling. He feels the blood rush to his face.

"You'll have to introduce him to me!" Brian laughs, not knowing that he already knows the very guy in question.

"Maybe not, he doesn't seem very...I don't know, but I don't think you should talk to him. It's just something about him screams danger. Not the good danger, but the type of danger that says 'hey, if you get to know me, I'll kill you.' Or, 'I'm being used by a gang of hoons as something or other, so if you talk to me they'll use you to.' That sort of thing,” Evan explains. Jon stays speechless. He’s not a killer. He’s not being used by a bunch of bad guys. Jon was beaten up by his dad so that makes him hesitant about the world. So that probably makes him seem shifty.

"Ok then..." Brian trails off.

"Wait a seco- I see him! Maybe I should stop by and give him a visit,” Evan says. Sure enough, across the pitch Jon spots him strutting his stuff.

"Woah Evan, settle down, you don't need to get violent with him!" Wildcat chuckles.

"As much as I'd love to hear this, I have to get going. Talk to you all later. Bye!" Jon said as if he wasn't about to get his face pounded in. He hangs up after a chorus of byes. As he walks over, a couple of his friends join him. Quickly, Jon grabs his headphones out of his pocket, puts them into his phone, opens Spotify and plays Afterlife by Avenged Sevenfold. People sometimes say Avenged Sevenfold seem bad, but Jonathan enjoys the music and that's all that matters.

He taps his foot in rhythm to the song as they approach him. Evan rips the headphones out of his ear. He turns off his phone and puts it away.

"Hey Evan and the crew, what's up?" Jon says, almost mocking him. 

‘It's like I’m asking them to beat me up,’ Jon thinks. Evan turns off his phone and puts it in his pocket, probably leaving the gang in wonder of why ‘scarface’ sounds like Delirious if they heard him.

"So, are you gonna tell me why you have scars across your back?" He says, he doesn't even need to add a threat. Jon rolls his eyes.

"I hardly think that's any of your business, you don't need to know because it doesn't concern you." Just as he finishes speaking a blinding pain races up Jon’s jaw. What's his problem? Evan knocks him over and straddles him. Jon tries with all his might not to blush, and somehow manages to succeed. 

"How about now?" He questions, curiosity flooding his voice now, rather than hatred. Jon huffs and turns his head away from him. He grabs his chin and makes Jon look him in the eye.

"It still isn't your business,” Jon refrains his laughter. This situation is so ridiculous. Here Jon is, with his crush pinning to to the ground, threatening him to tell him about what his dad did to him or he'll beat him up.

Evan punches Jon’s face again. Violence isn't the answer, even he should know that. 

"Bosh his face in Ev!" One of the boys call out.

"Look, I appreciate that you're so concerned for me, but beating me up isn't going to get me to tell you. Try something else,” he explains. Evan seems taken aback. He takes the hand that's been punching him and runs it over his shirt, across Jon’s stomach. He stops when he feels the scar on it and bunches up the fabric, ready to rip it off.

Don't get hard, don't you fucking dare. Jon steels himself. The blush creeps onto his cheeks, darker than ever. How is anyone not seeing this?

"I'll keep going if you don't tell me,” Evan says. Haha it's so funny he thinks Jon is straight. But Jon better let him keep thinking that.

"Ok, ok! Get off me and I'll tell you. You're crushing me!" He agrees. Evan smirks, Jon saw that he was going to help him up, but he caught sight of his friends and didn't. What? Jon looks him dead in the eye and opens his mouth as if he’s going to tell him. Then he bolts. He runs across the football oval with them shouting behind him. He doesn’t care, he keeps running and finally loses them. He finds another spot to sit at and his phone rings again. He quickly catches his breath before answering it.

It's the group again.

"Hi,” Tyler greets him. Evan is the last one in the call.

"What happened after I left?" Jon asks them.

"Well Evan went up to whatshisface and then he hung up! Care to explain Evan?" Tyler asks.

"Well, I was trying to get him to tell me about his scars. T-that's all,” Evan stutters, as if he's embarressed.

"That's all my ass! What else happened Evan you're embarrassed about something,” Craig pipes up.

"Um, well, I pinned him to the ground and was punching him-" Evan was cut off by Nogla.

"Evan you fucking asshole don't go around hurting people for the sake of hurting them!" The irishman's voice rang out.

"Sorry Nogla, but I have a reputation of the so called 'bad boy'. I never wanted it to be, but it just stuck,” Evan says.

"So help me if it's these so called 'friends' we keep hearing about peer pressuring you, I'll kick their nuts up their throats!" Nogla shouts, followed by Lui asking him to use his non existing inside voice.

"And?" Craig prompts.

"Aaaaaand, IfelthisstomachbecauseIwasbeinganidiotandwantedtogetitoutofhim. There I said it,” Evan rushes out, and takes a breath.

"What the hell Evan? Slow down,” Marcel laughs. Evan sighs.

"I-I felt his stomach because I was being an idiot and wanted to get it out of him,” Evan says, almost as a whisper. Everyone whoops.

"Aye, that's my gay buddy right here!" Terroriser laughs.

"I'm not gay! It was an impulse and I now realise I shouldn't've done it because who the fuck goes around doing that?! If the word gets out, I'm a goner. 'Extra extra! Read all about the gay asian who we used to love but now hate!' It's bad enough that my friends were there, but they left after the little event,” Evan says, he sounds distraught.

"Don't worry, I don't think they'll tell,” Jon reassures him, because he knows he won’t tell anyone.

"Aside from that. Did he feel good?" Brian asks.

"OH MY GOSH TERRORISER KNOCK IT OFF!" Marcel shouts at him. They all laugh, including Terroriser.

"Gays will be gay,” he says, Jon can almost hear the shoulder shrug.

"I have to go, the day ends soon,” Jon says.

"Same here, bye guys,” Evan says. Jon makes his way back to the manky lockers and gets his stuff for the last period of the day.

Jon is going to love how awkward it's going to be between 'scarface' and Evan now. Great, just great.


	5. Chapter Five

Jonathan's POV

After school I head to the park near my house. I always have a Jason mask in my bag for emergencies in which I have to hide my face. I can only think of two situations. If I either saw my dad again or Evan saw me.

The park has a quaint fountain in the middle, with stone seats surrounding it. All along the sides of the park have huge, green trees and bushes, except the front. The front has a huge, black, gate that never closes, so there isn't a reason it's there. At the back left corner there's a playground for children, with a couple of slides and a swingset. Winding paths made of dirt and gravel are all over the park, with newly planted saplings on either side of the paths, destined to be beautiful trees someday.

I make my way to the back right corner and sit under the tall tree there. I pull out my mask and put it on, seeing that everyone else is on the other side of the park. My hand rummages through my bag full of new homework, trying to find my phone and headphones. The rubber covering on the cords of the in ear headphones find their way into my hands. I pull them out, with my phone attached to them. I put them in, open spotify and put on Through The Fire And The Flames by Dragonforce.

Images of Wildcat trying to nose whistle this song fly around my head. I chuckle to myself. After sitting there for half an hour listening to music and remembering everything our gang has done I see a particular someone enter the park.

Evan.

Evan's POV

Once I got off the bus, I head home, put down my bag and left again. I walk around the small neighbourhood trying to find the familiar park I visit every now and again. I eventually reach the black gates, they're open.

My eyes sweep over the small park and come to rest on a person with a vaguely familiar hockey mask on. What the hell? I start walking over there. Once I reach there, the person puts their headphones away and looks up at me.

"Evan!" The person says excitedly, the voice belonging to a man. He's willowy, probably can't lift anything heavier than 10kg. There's a blue hoodie lying on the ground next to him, leaving him in a tight fitting blue shirt. He's tense right now, letting me get an even better look at his gorgeous form.

"Evan? It's me, Jon! You know, Delirious!" He says, and points to himself. I smile at him, pull him up and envelope him in a hug. He's warm, comforting.

"What's up man? It's so good to finally meet you!" I say and pull away from the hug. He laughs, I can definitely pinpoint that unique laugh as Delirious'.

"Not much, it's heaps colder here than it is in North Carolina though." He replies. We both sit down under the tree.

"I just went back to school today, I got a bit of homework." I smile at him, looking straight into the mask holes. Blue eyes stare back at me. Blue like the walls in a baby boy's room. Blue like the sky on a clear day. The blue eyes staring back at him are clear as gentle ocean water. It's almost impossible for an eye to hold as many shades of blue as his do. It's striking, handsome.

"Soooooo, are you going to take off your mask?" I ask, stretching the so. He laughs and shakes his head, brown hair falling down the top part of the mask.

"Not for a long time, Evan." He replies. I sigh.

"Why did you move here?" I ask, not taking into consideration that it might be personal. I didn't realise until I saw him flinch a little.

"My parents had a divorce." He states.

"But why Canada?" I ask, cocking my head to the side.

"My dad's forbidden to enter Canada." He laughs. Did he just say what I thought he said?

"What, why?" I ask, chuckling loudly.

"I have no idea." He replies, still laughing.

"Maybe he fucked a moose." I suggested. If Jon was drinking when I said that, I would be soaked. He burst out laughing, doubling over before sitting up straight. I join in laughing, the idea is ridiculous.

"Nah, I'm pretty sure that's not it." He laughs. I get out my phone and get a group chat, excluding Jon, seeing he's right next to me I'll just put it on loudspeaker. Everyone quickly picked up.

"What the fock do you want now Evan?" Nogla complained.

"Calm your tits Nogla, you won't believe who I have here with me. Jonathan!" I yell. A beautiful laugh rings out from next to me.

"Holy crap it actually is! Give us a description of his face!" Wildcat exclaims.

"Well, he's wearing a mask, but he's got blue eyes and brown hair. That's all I know. Oh, he's also got a shit load of lanky weirdness and a black stud piercing in one ear, I now realise." I tell everyone. Jon looks at a certain patch of grass on the ground. His ears are tinted pink.

"Oooh! Sound hot. Any wicked ass scars or tattoos?" Brian asks. I roll my eyes and Jon chuckles.

"Not that I s-," I pause, my eyes land on what looks like a scar on his jawline, it disappears into his mask. It's probably really small. "Oh, wait a second, yeah he has a small scar of what I can see on his jawline." I finish my sentence. Brian gasps.

"That's hot!" He exclaims. Groans and laughs echo.

"Shut the hell up Brian!" Wildcat laughs.

"Nah, I have to agree with Brian this time. He sounds hot." Brock says genuinely. Jon clears his throat.

"Um, I'm still here?!" He exclaims. Everyone laughs.

"Oh yeah, sorry GILF." Brian says sarcastically.

"What the heck is a GILF?" Jon asks. The whole group groans 'erm', expecting him of all people to know.

"I-It's best if you don't know." Mini says. He coughs then rushes out "Guy I'd like to fuck." Then coughs again. We all laugh, but Delirious didn't hear properly.

"All of you will have to come over some time for a party or something. You know, with a couple of giiiiiirls." I say stretching girls. "Besides Brian, no girls for you."

"Hey, I'll still come for the booze though." He laughs.

"We should have that in about five months?" Lui suggests. Everyone murmurs in agreement.

"Evan, I have to leave now, I have homework I need to do." Jon says from next to me.

"Bye Jonathon." The group monotones. I laugh.

"Yeah, I better go to, we can play GMOD tonight. Ya?" I suggest, with another chorus of agreement. I hang up. Jonathan gathers all his belongings in his arms.

"Seeya around, Evan." I can hear the smirk in his voice. I smirk back at him.

"Likewise, Jonathan." I reply. He leaves the park and turns the corner. I stand there for a few minutes. I could've ripped the mask off his face, but I respect that he doesn't want to show me. I sign internally, now I'm too fucking curious to let it go. I need to know what he looks like if it kills me!

I start walking home. When I reach home mum calls out to me saying dinners ready. She gets a huge tray of lasagna from the oven. Dad rushes over to help her dish it up. I smile, taking in the harmony of my parents, and being grateful that they aren't divorced like Jonathan's. Now that I think about it, Jonathan's dad must've done some bad things to be forbidden to enter Canada. And what's to say that he won't come here illegally?

After dinner I do the dishes for my parents and rush my homework. I start up my computer and open skype, everyone is already on. They invite me into the call. I accept. Obviously Jonathan's facecam had to be turned off, which bothered me more than it should've.

We discussed the party meetup thing while continuing to bomb Nogla, ending with him rage quitting and the rest of us laughing. Everyone just seemed to be busy with something up until the opening in five months. I bid everyone goodnight, turn on my computer for the night and head to bed. Jonathan never once leaves my mind.


	6. Chapter Six

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Please read author's note at the end. Trigger warning, don't read if you are sensitive to cutting.

3rd Person POV

5 months flew past, with sideway glances from the girls and abuse from Evan and his friends. Jonathan, quite frankly, was sick of it, and had said that to Evan a few times but he dismissed it. He met up with Evan as Delirious once a week, which was pretty good. His online friends were teasing him as usual, but they never went too far, it was all fun and games.

Evan was annoyed at his friends, not the virtual ones. Annoyed was an understatement, Evan was furious. They've been egging him on to keep harassing Jonathan, and Evan knew he couldn't say no because his friends would turn against him. He quit calling him scarface, because most of the girls were saying Jonathan is actually hot, which he is. Every time he threw a punch or nasty comment Jonathan's way he always swore it was the last, but it never was. He found himself falling in a deeper love with Delirious, even though he has only seen his eyes. His heart would beat faster everytime he met up with him.

Jonathan's POV

"Alright Jonathan, I have to go back down to North Carolina for a few weeks, you'll have to clean, cook, and the rest. I'll send you up money every week." My mum explains to me. I nod. She hugs me. It feels nice, comforting, warm.

"Are you sure you'll be alright? I'll miss you darling." She squeezes my cheeks.

"Yeah mum, I'll be good."

"Oh, and one more thing, no parties in this house! You can go to parties, but none are here. Got it? And no getting drunk or having sex!"

"Mum!" I exclaim, my jaw smacks the ground. She throws her head back laughing at her own hilarity. She's better without dad. I agree to her rules. She puts all her bags in her little, green car, gives me one last kiss on the cheek and drives off. I slouch my shoulders once she turns the corner. I am exhausted. Not to mention sick of all the crap Evan's been giving me. Maybe I should've just said it was me straight off the bat, but it's way too late now. Like, waaay too late. I've noticed that he's been a bit hesitant with what he's been saying lately, like if he says something I'll break like glass.

Who knows? Maybe I will, I feel like I'm falling apart at the seams. I'm leaking out at every crack, going to be drained entirely soon, too soon. I wolf down some toast, grab my bag, lock up the house and rush off to the bus. I take a seat near the front where no one else is around, and stare out the window for the whole trip. The trees blur into one another like my thoughts.

When the bus pulls up at school I step off with weights on my shoulders, sinking me into the damp ground. I trudge to my locker, where I see the word FAG spray painted across it in all capital, red letters. I flinch at the slur. No one knows how true it is, but have they guessed? Am I too obvious with my infatuation with Evan? I open my messy locker, put everything in it and shut it. I turn around to see a large group of people behind me, bystanders, and Evan standing in front of me holding a pocket knife. One of his friends push him forward, as if Evan doesn't want to do what he is about to. Or at least, that's what a part of me deep down wants.

"Hello Jonathan. I heard you're a fag." I catch his eyes, they are misty, and not meeting mine. I'm right, he doesn't want to do this, but it doesn't make it hurt less. "So here's a knife, use it whatever way you want to. Slit your throat, slash open your wrists and thighs. No one cares, not even your dear old dad." He flashes me a sick grin before turning around and walking off, the crowd following him. His friends slap him on the back, whooping and making a ruckus.

I feel like someone's thrown a brick at my head. Not just one, two hundred. I fall to the ground and hug my arms around my knees and droop my head. What is going on? Why are they doing this, what have I done to them?

A lone tear falls down my cheek, no one is around to see it. Does that mean it really happened? Does no one care?

***

When I get home that night, I throw my bag down, race upstairs and collapse on my bed. I cry my eyes out until I shrivel up like a prune. Once I finish crying I notice the weight in my chest, the pounding of my head, my heart. A pressure is waiting to be released. I don't know how to release it. Not yet-I spot the shiny handle of the knife sticking out of my pocket. Maybe I do.

I stare at it for a minute before stumbling to the bathroom. I shut the door behind me. I look up at my hideous reflection, huge scars running down my face, puffy, red eyes and trembling lower lip. Pathetic, no wonder no one likes you. I pull the knife from my pocket, turning it over a couple of times in my hand. What if I-. Am I going to do this? No stopping-. Yes, I am.

I put the blade to my wrist and slice, feeling pain shoot up my arm. I gasp. Of course it's going to hurt, idiot. I run it over my skin a few more times, letting it sink in what I'm doing. Wait, what am I doing? This is stupid! STOP!! I wash my bleeding arm and collapse, tears flowing freely again. I can't wear short sleeves. I'll have to be careful about everything I pick up. I start sobbing. I'm weak. I'm useless.

What have I done?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A/N: Please don't hate me! I almost cried writing this, I hated writing it. But yeah, I know this chapter is short and I'm sorry that it's short. If you are a cutter, please stop. And I know that's easier said than done, but you're wrecking a beautiful body. If you don't think you're beautiful, get a better mirror. There is beauty in every person, including you, whether it be your personality or laugh or natural ability to make others feel better. And just like Jon, you won't be able to wear t-shirts anymore! There are several hotlines you can ring if you need someone to guide you, they are free and confidential. Please, I believe that no human body should be hurt if it can be helped.


	7. Chapter Seven

Evan's POV

Seeing Jonathan trudge into school the day after I told him to kill himself broke my heart. His face has streaks of sorrow and pain through it and his shoulders hunch over like someone, me, has placed weights on them too big for him to bare. I silently follow him, and notice how he flinches away from every sudden movement. I frown and walk away before I get caught. As I walk away I walk straight into James, Riley and Chad, the so called 'friends' of mine, but I wish they weren't. There isn't a more notorious group in the school.

"Hey Evan. We didn't see you waiting for us at the parking lot this morning. That's a first." James says, leaning over me, bright green eyes looking down at me, treating me as prey rather than peer. James has that way with people, instant intimidation. If you were to lie to him, he would instantly know. Then beat you up for it. Chad is always there to egg James on, but Riley usually stays silent at the back and talks to me. I feel sorry for him sometimes. Riley does the crazy things the boys tell him to do, because they can't do it themselves. Isn't that a sign you shouldn't be doing it?

"Yeah, I've just got some unfinished business I need to attend to." I say, averting my eyes to the ground. Showing emotion to James and Chad could mean the difference between going through the day with a black eye or not. Despite being "friends", they have to keep me "in line", or, in the English language, under their command.

I realised a long time ago that they're the ones who've brought me into a world of hurting people who get in my way. Fuck, half of the people weren't even doing anything! It's slowly reducing over the months, without the boys noticing (thank the lord for small miracles). My online friends know about the whole affair and are trying to help me get out of this so called friendship with minimal damage. Del and I have organised a meet up at my house tomorrow afternoon, a Saturday. Craig, Nogla, Lui and Brian are already flying over. My house is pretty big and we have a few spare rooms, so they'll be staying over for a few days while my parents are away on business.

"Ok, you go do that then. We'll leave." James eyes me up and down, squinting. He turns and walks the away, the other two tailing behind. I turn, sigh, and walk up to Jon.

"Hey." I say, but he doesn't hear me. I grab his arm. Jon flinches and looks to me, his eyes simultaneously brightening and darkening when he realises it's me. He pulls his arm away.

"Yes?" He says, crossing his arms over his chest as a form of protection from me.

"Can you please hear me out?" I ask. He nods, letting his arms fall to his sides. Time to come clean. "These past few months I've realised I've been a dick bag, and I know I can't change what I've done, but I ask for forgiveness anyway. I need your help. My friends have been pressuring me - and I know that is no excuse - and I haven't been able to get out of it. I need a way to get out of doing their bidding, so will you help me? I think if we work together, we can get them off our backs. I understand if-"

His hand presses over my mouth. Jon's smiling up at me, his eyes gleaming.

"Yeah, I guess I can forgive you. On one condition." He says. I nod, the corners of my mouth turn up. "Don't ever get yourself stuck in toxic relationships ever again." I nod again. "And don't be a dick bag to anyone else."

"Of course. Maybe we can start over?" I ask, sticking my hand out. Jon takes it and shakes it.

"Hi, I'm Jonathan. What's your name?" He asks.

"Evan. Nice to meet you Jonathan."

"I hope we can be friends."

***

"Finally Evan! Now we just need to shake your douche friends!" Tyler says, his voice chopping a bit over a laggy skype connection.

"Yeah, that'll be tough." I say. It sounds easy, but it's going to be a hell of a journey.

"Evan, have I met these douche friends?" Del says, followed by a scream as Tyler blows himself up, orange and red flash on the screen.

"Probably, maybe walking the streets or something. If you see three boys with the air of butt trumpets that's them."

"A Very Potter Musical, good choice Ev." Marcel rings out, the only one to get the reference. "Why hasn't Del beaten them up yet?"

"Good question." Jon and I answer at the same time, followed by a fit of laughter.

"It's not a one man job, it's a job for the whole squad!" He says.

"So, is anyone already in the land of polar bears? You two get a week off school yeah, but we're here for two weeks?" Tyler asks.

"Yeah." Del replies "You can come and legally gate crash the school".

"Awesome, more time to cause trouble." Everyone seems to have had the same thought. We all burst out laughing.

"Actually, I rung up your school to give a presentation on careers, it's also for your class. What are the odds, I totally didn't rig that, not at all." Nogla shares. He's on a plane at the moment, so he's only connected by phone.

"Really? Well then, wish me luck." I reply, followed by a bout of laughter. "Mini, Nogla, Lui and Brian are land in a few hours, so I'm going to the airport to make sure they don't get lost. I don't know about you guys."

"I'm leaving in the early hours of tomorrow morning." Moo says, followed by a chorus of "same" from everyone else.

"Perfect, see you all tomorrow." I say, before shutting down my computer.

***

BEEEEEEEP BEEPBEEPBEEP BEEEEEEEP

My hand rockets out to shove my alarm clock off my desk. Why the fuck is it going off at 7 when it's Sunday? I shoot up out of bed when I realise. I throw on my clothes, rush my breakfast and grab my car keys. I freeze when I hear a knock at the door. I open it to be greeted by a familiar hockey mask.

"Hey! I'm here to help with the picking up of the nugget heads." I don't need to see his face to know he's smiling.

"I think I'm going to need all the help I can get." I step outside and lock the door, the sun is just rising and the early morning rays illuminate his hair. "It's a good thing my parents are in China at the business meeting, or they'll wonder why I'm inviting a bunch of older men into my house." My tone changes to a mock of my mother's voice. "Evan! I thought we told you no orgies in this household!"

Del laughs, a beautiful sound I'll never get sick of hearing. My stomach does a somersault.

"Er, come here." I say directing us to the garage, my guard slipping slightly. I open the door and tell him to jump in the front seat as I get in the drivers.

"Let's get 'er goin'!" I say as I turn on the car. Jon chuckles. It sounds familiar. I've definitely heard it on someone else. But who? Wait, what am I doing? I've known Jon for ages and I've never thought his laugh reminds me of someone else. It's all in my head.

Our ride to the airport is about an hour, and is filled with ridiculous covers of Taylor Swift songs. Surprisingly, Del can hit the high notes, even if he wasn't singing properly. Somehow, I find a close park. We go into the airport and find out that their plane is landing. A couple of minutes later and I'm greeted by the sight of the nugget heads themselves.

"Hey! We're glad you two are here, or we would've gotten lost. Canada's a rough place." Nogla exclaims, followed by a muffled "not" from Lui.

"Hey, polar bears can rip your eyes out if they wanted to!" Delirious counters.

"Ah! The man himself! I don't think I've ever met you in person Del." Brian says, slinging his arm around his shoulder. A wave of jealousy washes over me. Woah, what the heck Evan, he's just greeting him. Terroriser is just a friend. He's not into Del.

"Check out your form, you're so lithe! I think my man crush just multiplied by ten." He chuckles. Nevermind. But, they wouldn't, would they?

"Evan! Good ta see ya mate. Woah, a bit aussie there. I've never even been to Australia!" Brian says as he bear hugs me. A few minutes after we all greet each other, the boys pick up their rental car and Del and I start leading them home.

"Betcha they get lost." I say.

"Oh don't worry, they will, even if they have us to follow, Nogla will fuck up somehow." Del laughs, it's so contagious that I join in. 

"Don't worry? That's exactly what I'm doing!" Sure enough, after half an hour, they're gone. I pull over and ring them.

"Hello? Where are you?" I say.

"Um, Toys 'R' Us?" Nogla says from the other end of the line.

"What?" I say in utter confusion. Del can't hear what they're saying, he's so confused.

"Yeah, we took a wrong turn off." He says before hanging up. I sigh, putting a hand on my forehead.

"They're at Toys 'R' Us." I say, before both of us burst out laughing.

***

After a long period of driving, we find the right Toys 'R' Us. When we enter the shop we are blessed with the sight of Lui and Mini engaged in a duel, using Styrofoam swords, Nogla racing a plane around the shop and Brian chatting up one of the workers. The lady at the door asks Del to remove his mask.

"Miss, the doctors insist I wear this to keep the harsh environment off my skin. My face was burnt earlier this year." He counters, pointing to the little scar on his jawline as 'proof'. I fight my giggles downs. Horror crosses her face, and she apologies.

"Hey, you two! Stop trying to stab each other. Brian, leave the poor man alone! Nogla, land the plane this instant!" I shout, before laughing at the stupidity of the situation. They drop the toys and walk out of the shop.

"Sorry for the inconvenience." I say, before dragging Del out by his hood. The guys are shouting high-fiving by their car.

"Sorry, but it was too good of an opportunity to let pass!" Nogla explains, but Del cuts him off.

"It's fine, just tell us first, don't leave us out on the fun!" Del laughs.

***

We eventually make it home. In the next couple of hours, everyone else arrives. We all greet each other, some are trying to persuade Del to take off his mask.

"It's no use guys, I've been trying for months!" I laugh.


	8. Chapter Eight

3rd Person POV

"Yeah, so she's like 'take off your mask' and I'm like 'I was burn victim you fuck' and she pissed off!" Jon finishes recounting his story. A few laughs and groans echo around the room.

"That's so stupid! How did that work?" Tyler shouts, followed by Jon shrugging his shoulders. Brian runs into the room, toting a half empty bottle, tipsy, like most of the people in Evan's living room.

"Guys, get this." Brian got everyone's attention, swaying on his feet. "We play, like, truth or dare. And we all have fun." Brian hiccuped. A pillow or two hit him in the head, knocking him to the ground. Lui bounded forward from his place on the couch.

"But come on guys, we can use this as blackmail! It's perrrrrrfect!" Lui says, followed by a couple of sounds of agreement.

"Fine, but I'm not taking this off." Jon says, pointing an accusing finger at everyone.

"Yeah, we won't." Everyone replies. Everyone sits down in a circle. Brian puts the bottle in the middle and spins it, and it lands on Nogla.

"Truth or daaaaaare." Brian drags out. Nogla immediately replies dare. Predictable.

"Evan, go grab a lemon." Evan leaves and comes back with half a lemon in his hand. "Lui take your shirt off and lie down." Lui does it, with a couple of shouts of protest, but Brian doesn't change his mind. Evan passes the lemon to Brian, who then rubs it on Lui's collar bone and up his throat, then puts the lemon in his mouth.

"Ok, Nogla. You have to lick the lemon juice off of Lui, then take the lemon out of his mouth without using hands." Nogla cries in protest when Brian announces the dare.

"No, you can't back out now!" Tyler laughs out. Nogla grimaces, but crawls over to Lui laying on the ground.

"It's ok, yeah?" Nogla asks, Lui's heart warmed that he asked for consent. Lui nods, and a smile slips onto his face. Everyone except the two boys realise that Evan's recording the whole dare on his phone. Nogla lowers his face to Lui's collarbone and licks away the lemon juice- and it's killing Lui. They've both had a crush on each other ever since they moved in together, but the other doesn't know. This dare is making it ten times worse. Lui lets out a soft moan, but not soft enough for Nogla to hear.

Nogla licks slow strips up Lui neck. He then moves up to take the lemon out of his mouth, their lips brushing for a split second. Nogla sits upright, spits out the lemon and dives right back in to kiss Lui again. Cheers erupt around the room.

Evan finishes the recording and hurries out of the room just as the couple pull apart, smiling at each other. Evan enters the room again, a coy smirk resting on his face. He reclaims his seat next to Jon.

"Del, truth or dare." Nogla asks once he manages to rip his eyes from Lui. Del sits on the question for a few seconds.

'If I say dare, they ask me to take off my mask. If I say truth, they'll pry into questions I can't answer.' Jon ponders. He decides with a cautious truth.

"What's the story behind the ear piercings?" Nogla asks. Brian whacks his arm, outraged that he would waste his question on something so mundane. Jon raises his hand to one of the black studs and fiddles with it.

"Mum got them pierced when I was a baby. Nothing special." Del explains, dropping his hand in his lap.

"Yawn, where's the action in that?" Marcel burst out, laughter following in it's wake. Delirious crosses his arms and furrows his eyebrows, the boy's can't tell he's pissed.

"Marcel, truth or dare?" He says, his triumphant grin hidden by his mask. He knows what he's going to pick, and it's going to be a tough one.

"Dare!" He says, fist bumping Brock. Brock catches Del's eye and winks. Brock's a smart man, he knows what's coming.

"I dare you to push a coin fully around a toilet seat lid with only your tongue." Del finishes with a dusting of his hands and a straightening of his back. The room riots.

"WHAT?!"

"Savage, Delirious!"

"What the fuck, how do you expect me to do that?" Marcel sighs, throwing his hands up and head back. Del shrugs.

"It's not my problem, get to it." Everyone shoves Marcel to the bathroom, Evan gets a coin from a nearby room. Marcel drops to his knees as Evan puts the coin at the start of the lid.

"Do I really have to do this?" Marcel looks up at Jon, his eyes reflecting what he hoped was mercy, but turned out to be constipated. Del nods, his eyes betraying his utter excitement.

"You're a bitch." Marcel mutters as he starts pushing the coin around. Craig's holding onto Tyler in anticipation, Nogla's biting his nails and Brian is chanting Marcel's name under his booze ridden breath.

Marcel makes it to the other side of the toilet lid. His face lights up with triumph. He picks up the coin, throws it on the ground fist pumps the air.

"Fuck you I'm the best!" Marcel screams over the applause.

"Are you sure? We aren't the ones that just licked a toilet seat..." Brock points out, a smirk resting on his face. Marcel turns his nose up and flips him off. Evan gets Marcel some strong mouthwash. They head back out to the disarranged living room. Marcel tails behind a few seconds later, his breath cleaner.

"Craig, truth or dare?" Marcel points an accusing finger at Craig, his other arm lift up behind his head.

"You look like an anime character." Lui guffaws, Tyler whacks him over the head.

"What's it gonna be?"

"Truth."

"Are you straight?"

Craig's involuntary stiffen of the shoulders gives it away. His lips press into a tight line and his eyes narrow. He puts his hands in his lap.

"I don't know." Craig averts his eyes to the ground, but Delirious didn't miss how they flickered over Tyler for the briefest of seconds. No one else picked up on it it seems, because they were too busy congratulating him. Brian raises his nearly empty bottle of booze to Craig and winks.

"Following in Brian's footsteps, Craigy?" Brian refers to himself in third person. Craig rolls his eyes, but smiles and nods. Once the congrats dies down, Del excuses himself for a 'phone call' because he knows Craig is going to ask Evan about 'Jon'.

Del breathes in the crisp night air and looks up at the endless abyss of stars and space. In this moment, Del feels small. Oh, how small he feels. Those stars are millions of billions of light years away, bound to have some matter of life form residing on them, but Del managed to be here, surrounded by people who love him. Del brushes his wrist, he knows doing that was a mistake. He doesn't want to die, he doesn't need to be distracted from the now.

His ringtone goes off. But it's not for his phone, it's for 'Jon's' phone for Evan to contact. He sees where this is going.

"Hello?"

"Hi Jon."

"Hey Evan. Is everything ok?" He knows the answer.

"Yeah, I'm sorry about this, it's a dare. What do you get when you cross a sheep and a kangaroo?"

"Um, I don't know Evan. What do you get?"

"Don't be ridiculous, they're completely different species, the chances of successful reproduction are zero." Snickers carry over the airway. Jon grins.

"A man of intelligence is always a turn on." He could hear the screams even from outside the house. Evan bids him a quick goodnight and hangs up before he has a chance to reply. He waits a couple more minutes before reentering the house, to make it non-suspicious.

Brian runs up to him, almost falling over in the process.

"D-del! You just missed the funniest thing ever!" Brian bends over and rests his hands on his knees as he continues to guffaw.

"Settle down Brian. What happened?"

"Evan pranked called a friend from school and he said that Evan turned him on with the joke!" Another fit of laughter runs around the room. Lui has his head buried in Nogla's chest. Brock's slapping his knee with giddyness. Craig is whacking Tyler on the back as an outlet.

"Good job guys, good job." Del claps slowly.

"Oh, Evan. I almost forgot to tell ye. I rung your school up earlier today and asked if I could come to ye school to give a speech on collage and stuff. I only did it because I want to meet those fuckboys you've been friends with and that kid you gave grief to." Nogla says, waving his hands around frantically, trying to get Evan's attention.

"I know, you told me earlier today. For the record, that 'kid I gave grief to' and I are friends now, it was a huge misunderstanding." Evan says, sitting up straighter and looking Nogla in the eyes. Nogla raises his hands defensively. Del smiles under his mask. It's nice to have the reassurance that they are truly friends and he isn't in some huge dream.

After a couple more hours of mucking around, the boys go to their rooms, Evan's house is big enough to accommodate them. No one misses Lui slip into Nogla's room that night. Brian passed out on the couch ages ago. Brock is sitting next to him, threading his fingers through his hair. Craig goes to his room with one final glance at Tyler. Marcel helps Evan and Del clean up. He doesn't last long, and crashes on the nearest chair.

"How come you won't take off your mask? We don't care how you look." Evan whispers. Del averts his eyes to the ground.

"Listen, I know you all want to see what I look like, but my face is a story for another time."

"That's fine, I was just curious." Evan closes the conversation, but he watches Del out of the corner of his eyes.

He's obviously an attractive man, despite the little scare poking out from under his mask. He's not muscly, but he's lithe, he's petite, he makes it work. His eyes shine millions of hues of blue, too many to count. His hair is soft, like it could be made of feathers. His legs are long, his body is proportional, how could this man possibly think he is ugly? Ugly is not defined by just the face, it is defined by the soul. This man is beautiful. He is glorious.

They clean up in silence. It wasn't awkward, it was comforting. Evan bids Del goodnight. Soon, operation kick ass begins.


	9. Chapter Nine

3rd Person POV

'Monday, monday, monday. Bloody monday, no one likes you, go away,' Evan repeats this mantra in his head. It follows him from his house, leaving the crew to run rogue around the streets of Canada, to the rickety bus, and to school. Jon was on the bus, they still sat apart to keep up Evan's façade. 

Jonathan slinks away to meet Evan elsewhere while he makes up some bullshit excuse for why he isn't hanging around "the crew" this morning. They squint at him, before accepting and walking off. Evan goes off in his own direction. He makes a pit stop by his locker to put his bag inside, then makes a beeline towards one of the huge trees out the back of the school. Jon has his headphones in, and didn't notice Evan approaching.

It was only then did Evan realise how beautiful Jon is. Evan and the rest of the year level knew that Jon was good looking, Jon had attracted the attention of girls, and some guys, in the past. But Evan never really stopped to think about how beautiful the morning sunlight looks filtering through his hair. How his small nose wrinkles when he puts on a sound that's too loud. How his plump lips turn up at the corners when he sees Evan.

"Evan! Come sit down," Jon pats the ground beside him. Evan snaps out of his thoughts and blushes when he comprehends the meaning of them. Evan knows he's bi, but he thought he has a crush on Del?

Jonathan Smith or H20Delirious?

Jon or Jon?

Evan hates the confusion. It would probably be easier if he was straight, if he wasn't divided between his two friends.

"How was your weekend?" Jon asks as he turns off his phone. He looks Evan in the eyes. Evan couldn't take it and looked away.

"Pretty good, some of my friends are visiting from overseas, eight or so of them. I've actually told them about the plan we have with James, Chad and Riley. They said they'd love to help whoop their asses," Evan explains. Jon chuckles.

"Did you mention me?" Jon asks.

"Yeah, they said they'd really like to meet you," Evan explains. Jon nods.

"So, what's operation kick ass about? You sent me a text about it on the weekend but I didn't understand..." Jon trails off.

"Well, I'm glad you asked," Evan starts.

***

"Which ones are they?" Nogla whispers into Evan's ear. Evan scoured the cafeteria for James, Chad and Riley. He quickly spots them and subtly points to them. Nogla squints and nods.

"Bloody bastards, I can already tell," Nogla shakes his head disapprovingly.

"That's because I've already told you about them, you idiot!" Evan wacks his arm in a playful manner. 

"Are we commencing operation kick ass on wednesday?" Nogla asks, his eyes darting around the crowded space to check for eavesdroppers. 

"Yeah, I'll explain it to everyone else tonight," Evan had briefly ran over what was going on with operation kick ass to Nogla and Jon, not Del, but didn't go into serious details. A teacher notices Nogla's visitor badge and calls him over. Evan nods at Nogla and goes his separate way. He meets up with Jon. 

"Is that one of your friends?" Jon asks, gesturing to Nogla.

"Yeah, he's helping with what's happening on wednesday," Evan shrugs it off. 

"I can't wait, they've really deserved whats coming their way," Jon grins, his pearly whites flashing. Evan still can't believe how beautiful Jon is. Evan softly smiles back.

***

"Ok class, we have a special guest speaker coming in today to talk to us about what courses to take at collage," Mr Cooper explains to the distracted class. They were all fiddling with their phones, their hair, or the person sitting next to them. That isn't good, considering these are the honor classes. To be fair, the only reason Evan is paying attention is because it's Nogla who's going to give the speech. 

Evan texts Delirious saying 'Nogla's giving the speech at our school now. $10 he stuffs it up'.

Delirious quickly replies 'I agree with you'. He texts back a minute later saying 'Mini disagrees, the little bitch thinks he's gonna do fine. Apparently, he rehearsed it'.

Evan laughs under his breath, and darts his eyes around the room to see if anyone else notices. No one did, so he texts Del back.

'Little do they know I put a surprise video on Nogla's computer last night. I'm recording his speech and I'll send it to you when it's finished'.

'Wtf Evan what is it????????'

'Too many question marks, and you'll see what it is in a few minutes". Evan is already smiling at what is coming. He puts his phone away as Nogla ducks under the small doorway and enters the room. He's an intimidating 6"4', to strangers that says that he could pummel them within an inch of their life, but Evan knows better. Nogla acts tough a lot of the time, but he's a huge teddy bear. Now that Evan thinks about it, all the crew are like this, tough teddy bears.

"Class, this is David Nogla all the way from Ireland. He's staying here for a couple of weeks and he made time to come speak to us about careers, say hi class," Mr Cooper tells them, gesturing to Nogla. Nogla shyly waves to the class. The class mumbles back an unenthusiastic greeting.

"If I spot anyone on their phones during this presentation, I'm confiscating it and giving you an after school detention," Mr Cooper says, glaring at the class. A dozen people huff and shut off their phones.

Nogla thanks the professor and slaps his equipment down on the desk. He fumbles a bit with the cord as he tries to plug it into the computer. Mr Cooper pities him and sets up the computer for him. While he does that, Nogla properly greets the class. Evan subtly props his phone up next to his books, out of Mr Cooper's field of vision, and presses record.

"Um, hello everyone. As you heard your teacher just say, I'm David Nogla and I live in Ireland. I'm currently taking a course at an Irish collage for music, and they graciously let me have time off to come talk to you about courses and stuff," Nogla finishes up. Mr Cooper got the first slide of Nogla's slide show up on the board. It's a title that says, it was pretty cheesy, 'Courses, Collage and you', in an ugly font with a green fill and black trimmings. The background is white besides one small photo underneath the title. It's a class photo of what Evan presumes is the music class. Nogla is up the back, his tall head looming over the others awkwardly. It's quite a humerous sight.

"At my collage, there was a variety of courses to take, including business courses, arts, language, medicine and so on. I'll show you all of the available courses at the local university for ye guys on the next slide. That's right, I did my research," a couple of giggles arise from Nogla's poor attempt of humour.

'No you won't,' Evan thinks, smiling internally. He knows exactly what's on the next slide. Nogla changes to the second slide and a low quality video starts to play. The video depicts a tall, pale man licking a smaller man's neck. The smaller man moans a little and the crowd around the pair are cheering them on. 

Evan hides his smile behind his hands, stifling his laughter. The rest of the class realise what's happening in the video and who the taller man is, the guest speaker, and burst out laughing. Some are bent over and are slapping their desks. Others are lightly giggling to themselves. Evan steals a quick glance at Jon, his eyes are shut and his hands are over his mouth, desperately trying to keep his laughter inside.

"Evan!" Nogla screams, his voice heightening several octaves. Evan quickly stops the recording and sends it to Del. Evan pockets his phone. Nogla storms over to Evan's desk and pulls him up by his upper arm.

"'Scuse me Cooper, but I need to talk to your student," Nogla mumbles as he drags Evan out of the classroom. The door slams shut. Mr Cooper rushes over to the laptop and shuts the screen.

"Mr Smith! Please follow those two outside the door to make sure they don't kill one another," Mr Cooper gestures tiredly to the door, then rests his forehead in his liver spotted hands. Jon controls his shaking and walks over to the door. He looks back at the class, a bunch of wild animals, and exits the room.

Evan's POV 

Nogla's face is beet red and his mouth is turned down in an angry snarl. He points an accusing, long finger at me.

"How dare you?! You embarrassed me in front of your class and your teacher, and made yourself look like a dickhead in the process!" Nogla whisper shouts, not wanting to let the class hear but there's enough force to let me know that he's ticked off. He's not gonna be angry for long, he'll definitely tell the boys about this tonight. The door clicks open, someone steps out, and the door clicks shut again.

"Sorry, the teacher sent me out to keep an eye on you," Jon averts his eyes to the ground, a sign of giving us privacy. Nogla looks him up and down, analysing him.

"That's fine. Nice face by the way Delirious," Nogla says approvingly. My heart stops and clatters to the ground. What? Delirious? My thoughts are confirmed when Jon's head snaps up at his nickname. He's petrified.

"Wait, what?" I blurt out. It can't be!

"Evan, that's Delirious, can't you tell by his voice?" Nogla asks in a tone that suggests that I am stupid for not knowing. I meet Jon's eyes. Blue. Like Delirious'. Exactly like Delirious'. Nogla gasps quietly, he didn't know that I don't know.

It all clicks in suddenly. Why Jon was new to our school when Delirious moved. Why Delirious won't show us his face. Why Delirious has a small scar on his chin, the rest obscured by the mask covering his face, and why Jon has a scar in the exact same location. Why they have the same body, same voice, same laugh, same eyes. Why I love them equally.

Jonathan Smith or H20Delirious?

Jon or Jon?

There is no competition, there never was. They are one and the same.

"Jon?" I whisper after a long silence. Jon's eyes reflect fear and sadness. He's like a deer trapped in the headlights. So what would that deer do? Flee.

So Jonathan Smith spins around and runs.


	10. Chapter Ten

3rd Person POV

"So he just...up and left?" Tyler asks, still confused about the topic of the conversation that Evan introduced. Evan nods as he fiddles with his sleeves. His eyes are trained on the floor, watching and waiting to see if it would swallow him whole. 

"Evan, I'm sure he'll turn up again, but for now we have to focus on Operation Kick Ass," Brian explains, resting a hand on Evan's slumped shoulder. Evan nods, defeated. Delirious, Jonathan, ran from the school in the last period of the day and hasn't been seen since. No one has visited his house to check on his, because Evan has only just informed them. Nogla and Evan searched the neighbourhood top to bottom straight after school, until 6 at night. They trudged back to the house with their shoulders slumped and hopes lost.

"Yeah, this is happening in two days time and we don't even know a thing about it. You've just planned by yourself," Tyler agrees. Jonathan is slipped to the back of Evan's mind and Operation Kick Ass becomes his main focus.

"For wednesday, I have a trick planned. Throughout the day we pit them against each other, until there's a big blowout after school. Little red notes in their lockers, big bang! Simple?" Evan explains, waving his hands around for effect. The boys murmur in agreement. 

"What sort of things will you write on the notes?" Lui asks. Evan grins wickedly.

"For the past couple of months I've been gathering information on all three of them. Like how James' girlfriend cheated on him with Chad, and how Riley was the reason Chad got suspended for destruction of property for a few days. Simple little things that will send them into brawling mode," Evan explains. The guys nodded in agreement. For the next hour they wrote out notes how Evan instructed them to, all caps in red letters. Evan was also quality control, anything too petty was scraped. The notes need to get the trio furious and vicious.

***

Tuesday came and went, Jonathan didn't show up to school and hasn't answered any texts or calls that the squad sent. Evan was starting to get super worried, but the group insisted that everything would turn out.

"He doesn't hate you, Evan."

"He's still going to be your friend."

"He might just be upset with himself."

"He'll get over it."

But Evan wasn't so sure. He has an uneasy feeling in his stomach. It stuck with him through Tuesday morning and afternoon (Jon still hasn't returned). It stuck with him on Tuesday night, giving him a fitful slumber. It stuck with him on Wednesday morning, Jonathan still hasn't shown himself.

***

Evan sways in his seat as the bus pulls to a stop outside the school. Jon hasn't been spotted since the incident on Monday, and Evan was stressing out of his mind. He stays with James, Chad and Riley that morning. When they aren't looking he slips a note into each of their books for throughout the day. There's five for each of them. Evan's planned it so that four of the notes will be opened at different times throughout the day, and Evan is going to put the extra note each into their lockers. It truly is a spectacular plan.

Evan makes up some bullshit excuse and leaves the boys to their devices. He bypasses their lockers, slipping the notes in, and dumps his bag in his own. Evan wanders around the school for the rest of the time left before classes start. He tries texting Jon, but he hasn't opened his messages. Evan's stomach twists itself into thousands of tight knots.

Evan just wants his blue eyed boy to be safe. No more bullying, no more secret identities, no more scarring. Evan wants to see Jon's cherry lips and glowing skin again. He wants to hear his loud laugh and accented speech. He wants to smell the pine cologne he prefers to use over big brand names. He wants to touch the smooth skin of his hands and his effortlessly fluffy hair. He wants to taste him, but he hasn't got the privilege of doing so, yet. 

Evan feels his breathing pick up. His heart beat is erratic and his breaths are short and quick. Evan threads his right hand through his hair, trying to control his breathing. But he can't. He just wants Jon back. He wants to know that he's safe.

Evan pulls out his phone and calls Brock. His oldest friend, the one he can always rely on. The phone rings several times before Brock picks up.

"Evan, what's up? Is Operation Kick Ass going to plan?" Brock greets. Evan's controlled his breathing by now, and is ready to actually talk to Brock.

"Yeah everything's fine. I just wanted to know if anyone's heard from Delirious yet?" Evan cuts to the point. 

"Hm, not that I know of, but Nogla and Lui are out at the moment getting stuff from the store down the road," Brock answers. Great, Evan thinks.

"Oh, okay then," Evan trails off, defeated. 

"Wait, Evan, are you okay?" Brock asks before Evan has the chance to hang up.

"N-no, I'm not, I just miss him so much and it's only been two days," Evan says.

"Evan, we all miss him too, but I have an inkling that your intentions with Jonathan are more than friendly," Brock says. Shit, he knows.

"U-um, yeah. About that, Brock," Evan starts, but he trails off.

"Yeah?" Brock encourages him.

"I-I think I love him,"

***

After school, Evan met the rest of the gang outside the front gates. Tyler's got his arm slung around Mini and Marcel's shoulders, Nogla's holding Lui's hand (they tell Evan that they are officially together), and Brock and Brian are standing next to each other caught up in conversation. Evan announces his presence by tripping over a stony patch in the concrete. The gang dissolves into fits of laughter. Evan regains himself quickly.

"The whole day I've been watching them. There's so much tension and they've been waiting to let it aaaall out," Evan grins wickedly. The other's whoop and high five each other.

"They've really got it coming, they've put you through so much shit, Evan. All this peer pressure and bullying bullshit," Marcel says as he steps forward and rubs Evan's shoulder. Evan nods. Craig suddenly shushes the group and points towards three boys. Evan confirms to the people who haven't seen them yet that it is them. The group conceal themselves behind one of the towering green hedges behind the gates. The trio are shouting at one another.

"What the fuck, Chad?! Melissa and I were solid until your fuckboy ass got in the way!" James shouts.

"Me?! What about Riley?! He almost got me expelled and he's framed you for heaps of things as well!" Chad shouts back. A few people begin to crowd around them.

"I wouldn't have done it if you two didn't treat everyone else around you like shit! Me included!" Riley's voice is the loudest of the three. It stuns Evan, he's actually never seen Riley so loud, or stick up for himself. 

"We don't treat you like shit! You should be lucky we even keep you around, you faggot!" James yells, pushing Riley backwards. That's when the fight broke out. More people crowd around them and start chanting, "fight, fight, fight!" 

James is throwing punches at Chad, who's trying to defend himself from James's fists and Riley's elbows. Chad's nose is bleeding and James has a black eye, but Riley is agile enough to dodge most hits from the taller boys. The fight rages on, but Riley scurries away, unnoticed by the two guys still beating each other up. A few teachers race out and break the two up. The crowd disperses, and Riley isn't caught.

Evan turns back to the guys. They start cheering at the success of their plan. No fighting is the number 1 rule, and it is not tolerated, James and Chad will be expelled. Craig tackles Evan into a hug and the rest of the boys are celebrating still. Evan hugs Craig back, and he catches Tyler's eyes. Tyler's eyes are filled with longing and sadness, so Evan pulls away from Craig. Evan knows what's up.

"I'm so happy that worked!" Brian throws his arms up. The group wrap up their victory celebrations and head back to Evan's house.

 

***

Two Days Earlier

Jonathan's POV

 

After fleeing from Evan, I don't know where to go. I don't want to go back home yet, because the boys might come knocking. I don't want to go to the park where Evan and I meet up and talk. I start walking away from the school, all I have on me is my phone. My feet scuff against the pavement, I keep my head down.

The sun begins to sink below the horizon, and I decide to head home. The only problem is, I have no idea where I am. The streets are overgrown with grass, the houses are run down and the street lamps are flickering. The street names are unfamiliar and the cold night winds are howling.

I panic a bit. I freeze to the spot and try to gain my bearings, to no avail. I get out my phone to search up directions, but right behind me light footsteps echo against the concrete. Before I know it, a cool, sharp object is pressing against my neck. It stings a little bit, then I feel a warm liquid trickle down from where it's pressed. I try to keep still. An arm wraps around my waist. 

A gruff voice whispers into my ear, "scream and you die."


	11. Chapter Eleven

3rd Person POV

The boys make their way back to Evan's house. Their footsteps are loud on the pavement, the excitement still flooding their bones. They'll be too caught up with each other to notice Evan. Mini and Nogla have a race back to the house, disappearing around the corner with the results unknown to Evan.

Evan kicks a stone and hums a tune to himself. He quickly finds himself submerged in worrying thoughts of Jonathan. Why didn't he tell Evan he was Delirious? Why hasn't he shown his face since Monday? He stops humming the tune, and Marcel turns to him.

"Evan, you feeling 'aight?" Marcel asks, worry lines cutting deep into his forehead. Evan absentmindedly nods his head, but then turns it into a shake.

"No, I'm scared shitless for Jon, I just want to know where he is and if he is safe," Evan sighs, rubbing his forehead.

"We're all worried, Evan, and we are all here for you. This isn't your fault," Marcel comforts, clapping Evan's back. They walk in silence to Evan's house, listening to Brian and Lui bicker over who got the best punch in the fight. Everyone catches up to David and Craig, to find them standing on the decking, staring blankly at a sheet of paper.

"What's that?" Evan asks.

"It's a note, address from Mr H.T.I.M.S, whoever that it. I think you all need to read this immediately," Craig replies, worry cracking his voice, eyes cloudy with tears.

The group enter the house, and Craig gives the letter to Evan to read out. 

"Dear Mr Fong,

It seems that you are stressing over your dear Jonathan's disappearance, but not to worry, he is safe with me. However, that depends on what you define as safe. He is currently roped to a chair in my basement, exactly seven streets away from where you are living with all of your faggot friends. If you can find my house within three days, Jonny-boy can leave.

Here's the catch, if you fail to get him, he will be slowly tortured to death and his body will be left by your doorstep. And if you fail to show up with $15 million, I will not only kill him, but you and anyone else you bring with you.

I live in a house with a green roof and one window, which are quite common here. I'd start if I were you.

Your truly, Mr H.T.I.M.S." Enclosed in the envelope was a lock of Jon's hair, with drops of blood on it. Evan felt the anger rise in him faster than it ever had before. He sunk to his knees, screaming his heart out, red hot tears trickling down his cheeks. He dropped the letter and hit the floor with his fists. 

His voice wears out quickly, and he's left feeling void. His poor Jonathan, in the arms of that crook, bruised and bleeding somewhere far from the sun's rays. Evan hunches over and embraces himself. He feels another pair of arms around his torso, and then another, and then the weight of the boys pulling him up off of the floor. They all have tears running down their faces as well.

They all rise from the floor, and sit on the chairs scattered around the living room. After the sniffling stops, Nogla clears his throat to speak.

"Alright, we need a plan. Firstly, we need to find out who H.T.I.M.S is, and find out where he lives. Then we need to find out what to do about the ransom. We obviously cannot get the money, so we'll have to figure out a way to trick him," Nogla states. Everyone nods in agreement, it's important to find out who the man is, and how to fool him easily. 

"We might have to ask around, maybe at the drug store because if he's kidnapping teens he's not mentally stable," Brock suggests, which is a good point. 

"So let's start now, Evan and I will stay here and try to decipher H.T.I.M.S, then the rest of you can split up and search the seventh street along to the left and right," Lui states, nodding his head as he speaks.

A collective 'yeah' rises from everyone in the group.

"Then let's start," Evan says, a determined but tired smile spreading across his face. Once everyone except Lui leaves, Evan slumps over in his seat. A sad smile alights Lui's face as he walks over to Evan. He rubs large, soothing circles into Evan's back.

"Everything's going to be fine, we are going to find Jonathan, and he's going to be ok," Lui coos. Evan's erratic breathing slows down to a normal pace. 

"I'm going to wash my face," Evan slurs, the letter crumpled in his hand. He takes it with him, leaving Lui alone in the living room. Evan sits the letter upright on the basin as he splashes his face with cold water. He looks up to his reflection, then looks down to the letter. 

Aha!

Evan picks up the letter with dry hands and shows it to the mirror. The name is reversed, but the letters are still readable except for 'S'. The author is not H.T.I.M.S, but Mr Smith instead. 

"Lui! Quickly!" Evan yells. Lui's pounding footsteps race to the bathroom, and Lui is excited at what he sees.

"We have his name! I'll text the boys to tell them to look for a Smith household!" Lui squeals in excitement. He shoots off a text, then smiles.

"We have a start!"

***

Jonathan's eyes adjust to the blaring overhead lights of the dank room. He swivels his head to see where the man who took it off is. He goes to stand up, but finds his legs restricted. A laugh echoes out from behind him.

"Nice try Jonathan, but there's no escaping now. You and your pathetic friends are up against ME! No one, can stop me now. Once I have the ransom money, I'll kill you and all of them as well. And there's nothing anyone can do about it. I thought you would've learnt that I'm unstoppable by now, but you're as thick as ever. Your cuts prove that." The man speaks in a gravelly voice. He grasps Jon's arms, tied to the chair. He quickly lets go and walks out from behind Jonathan.

The man has salt and pepper hair, with cold grey eyes and sallow skin. His meaty hands are balled into fists at his sides. He's got a massive build, and a massive glare to go with it. Jonathan would recognise it anywhere.

"D-dad?!"


	12. Chapter Twelve

"Awesome! Uh, now what?" Craig asks, confusion seeping into his voice. 

"Well, we find out who Smith is. We'll ask around for anyone who goes by Smith, while the rest of you try and locate the house in question," Evan says, gesturing first to himself and Lui, then to the rest of the group.

The rest left to continue their task, while Lui and Evan stayed behind.

"Wait, what's Jon's last name?" Lui asks, tilting his head to look at the letter with H.T.I.M.S written on it.

"It's Smith, why?" Evan replies, not following Lui's train of thought.

"Um, you don't think Mr Smith could be related to him, c-could he?" Lui let the fear creep into his voice.

"All I've heard about his family is that his dad was banned from Canada as a whole, so there's no possibility he could be here," Evan shakes his head.

"Unless...he came here illegally?" Lui says, and Evan's face blanched.

"I've gathered that his relationship with his father isn't great, but why would he come for Jonathan now?" Evan questions nobody, and Lui wouldn't know the answer either.

"Did he tell you his dad is a shit bag?" Lui says, laughing a bit as he does so.

"Indirectly, he's told me that he's a dickhead, and I also saw...something else a long time ago," Evan trails off, thinking of that P.E class many months ago.

"What do you mean?" Lui asks, whipping his head front the letter to Evan's face in a heartbeat.

"Well, when I first met Jon in person, we had a P.E class and I walked in on him changing, because the teacher sent me to get him because he was taking too long, and he had tonnes of scars criss-crossing his back. It was- horrific, I can't erase the picture from my mind," Evan says, hanging his head once he finished. Lui gasps softly.

"S-surely you- is there any chance you were mistaken?" Lui questions shaking his head. 

"No, because I confronted him about it afterwards, and he fled before he could tell me the truth. But he knew what I was talking about," Evan confirms Lui's fears.

"So, let me get this straight, Jonathan was being straight up abuse by his dad for god knows how long and he didn't tell us? He didn't get any help from us?" Lui says.

"Don't be angry though, you wouldn't either if you were in his position, I'd bet you'd be feeling embarrassed and ashamed," Evan says, and the truth is laid out to dry just like that.

***

Lui sent out a text to the group chat stating the situation with Jon's dad. It contains information about his abusive traits, and his misdemeanours with the law. Everyone agreed that it only made sense that it was Jon's dad who kidnapped Del. Brian was all for pitchforks and torches.

All they needed now was a way to locate where they are hiding, and a way to trick him briefly with fake money so they can take Jon and escape.

"We should have police backup so they can arrest that nutter," Brock texts, which gives Evan an idea.

"Everyone back to the house, I have a plan."

***

"I think I know where they are," Nogla states once he enters the house.

"Wait really?" Evan asks, shocked at Nogla's sudden outburst.

"Yeah, I think Smith's got Jon down at that warehouse seven streets down. It fits the description! There was only one window and it had a green roof. Tyler, Craig and I checked it out earlier today," David exclaims, shaking with excitement. They need their friend back.

"I peeked in the only window, and there was a man there, pacing back and forth, and I got a glimpse of his face. He's got the same eyes as Del," Tyler says.

"That's great, so you've confirmed Evan and I's suspicions," Lui replies.

"So what's your plan, Evan?" Craig asks.

"Well, we need a way to trick Smith into thinking that he has the ransom money, so I was thinking that the smartest thing to do is get the police involved. If they could give us some confiscated counterfeit to give to him, and once we leave with Jon, the police can arrest him. However, there are some flaws..." Evan trails off. 

"What flaws?" Marcel asks.

"Well, if Smith hurts Jon, or, god forbid, kills him, or us, for obvious reasons that is a flaw. We can't predict Smith's movements, maybe he's bluffing and has already killed Jon. Oh-oh god, I," Evan stumbles and tears cloud his eyes. He doesn't want to lose his best friend.

Brock envelopes him in a hug.

"It's a great plan, Evan. We need to contact the police right away. We're going to get Jonathan back," Brock comforts, rubbing circles into Evan's back. 

***

"You're friends can't save you now, freak! Your whore mother is back in North Carolina waiting for our return, and there's no way you're escaping now," Jonathan's dad torments, cackling.

"They'll stop you, you sick monster! Who abuses the woman they love and their own child?" Jonathan counters, and is met with a harsh punch on the face and stomach.

"Watch your tongue, boy! You were never like this, you knew your place. I guess I'll have to teach you again," he growls. He picks up a nearby belt and doubles it over in his hands.

"Go to hell," Jon yells. Smith hits Jon with the buckled end right over his collar bone, ripping a hole in his shirt and causing the spot to break and bleed. Agony washed over Jon's body, he was screaming in absolute pain and torture. He kept hitting Jon in various locations over his abused chest, and he couldn't escape because he was still bound to that damn chair.

"Please, please stop," Jonathan pleads, already knowing that it was in vain.

"No, I don't think so. It's been way to long since I've done this," Smith cackles and grins darkly. He keeps beating his son until his whole chest is covered in wounds, some will surely scar. Jon passes out to oblivion, ending his suffering.


	13. Chapter Thirteen

Evan, Lui and Daithi enter the downtown police station. Evan has the letter crammed in his pocket, and David has his arm casually slung around Lui's shoulders. The high difference between the two is rather striking.

The three approach the desk, where two men sat. One is willowy with blond hair, blue eyes, light stubble, and thin, pink lips. He is rapidly typing information into a computer. The man sitting next to him is stockier, with brown hair, green eyes and milky skin. He was furiously writing something down onto a sheet, then placing it onto a pile behind him before turning to face the three men.

"Good day, gents, how can we help you?" The man speaks in a rich tone and he straightens his badge.

"We're here to report a kidnapping that we believe occurred on Monday," Evan explains. He takes the letter out of his pocket and gives it to the man. The willowy officer stands to attention, resting his hands on the desk in front of him. 

"His name is Jonathan Smith, and we believe that he was abducted by his father. The man in question was prohibited from entering Canada through any method, and has a history of domestic violence upon Jonathan, and we also believe his wife," Evan explains, keeping eye contact with the officers. The men nod grimly. Evan had the lock of hair in his pocket, still coated in blood. He took it out and passed it to the cops.

"We received this with the letter, it's Jon's hair," Evan says sadly. The blond man puts it in a ziplock bag.

"We can send it away to get it analysed, just in case it isn't Jonathan's blood," blond explains.

"We think we know where he is, but he also had another requirement, or he'd kill us all. He demanded 15 million dollars, and you can see why that's pretty unachievable," Nogla explains from behind Evan. 

"Not to worry, we have a plan. My name is officer Bryce Mcquaid and this is officer Ryan Ohm," Bryce says.

***

Hours passed, Bryce and Ryan had permission to use confiscated money and we now situated outside the warehouse where they expected Jon to be. The Banana Bus Squad had bulletproof vests on underneath their clothes. They had bugs on them to record anything Smith said.

Now the crew was standing at the door to the warehouse, Evan toting the 'money', and the rest had a weapon to use if things went sour. Weapons like knives, bats, and other melee items. There were two police cars parked down the street, they were to drive up once the crew had entered the house.

"Alright everyone, this guy is really unpredictable, so please stay safe," Evan whispers. The squad had their weapons concealed from sight, so that Smith would let them into the warehouse straight away. Evan knocked the door, and heard heavy footsteps.

A man opened the door, he bore little resemblance to Jonathan, but they had the same eyes. While they enchanted Jon's face, they only made his father look menacing.

"I was wondering when you would show up, have you got the money?" He asks. Evan nods and hold up the bag. The man steps aside, letting all of the men in. Once everyone was inside, he locked the door. 

"Your precious Jonathan is just down here, you go down first," he points towards the basement.

"No, you lead us. We insist," Tyler replies. He knew the man would've pulled something dodgy if he followed them. He could've attacked someone, or worse.

"Ok," the man shrugs and walks down to the basement. Everyone follows suit.

In the middle of the dank room, there he was. Jonathan was bound to a chair, unconscious or asleep. His hair was falling in front of his eyes, and it looked unwashed. To everyone's horror, Jonathan's shirt was hanging to his by mere threads. It was coated with blood, still fresh. Jonathan was breathing heavily, but remained asleep. His wounds were on display, and some were still bleeding. Lui gasps softly at the sight before them.

"You-you beat him?" Craig stutters, "There's no reason to!"

"Of course there was, stupid boy! Him and his whore mother fled from me, he deserved every bit he got and more!" Smith shouts. From the chair, Jon stirs and wakes with a groggy moan.

"Guys! It's a trap!" Jon pants, his glistening blue eyes pleading his dearest friends to leave. Evan's chest tightened seeing Jon in pain like this, the man he longed for in agony.

"Give me the money, and I'll let him go, if not..." Smith trailed off. He pulled a large knife from his back pocket and held it up to Jonathan's neck. He pressed it in his skin, light enough to draw beads of blood. Evan steps forward on instinct, but Smith just presses the blade deeper in Jon's neck. Evan froze, and throws the bag at Smith's feet. He took the blade away, and opens the bag. He quickly glances inside and nods, satisfied at the contents. He drops the bag, then rips open Jonathan's sleeve. 

"I suppose your friends haven't seen these," Smith cuts the rope securing Jon's wrist to the chair, and holds it up for all to see. He trails the blade across the scars. Evan swallows harshly, they look self inflicted. Was it-was it him that caused that?

"My son is pathetic," Smith growls, throwing his wrist down again. Smith makes a long but shallow vertical cut up Jonathan's arm, Jon hissing in pain all the while. 

"Now that I have my money, I don't have a need for you or your little friends anymore. I'm going to make you watch them die, and then kill you. Does that sound nice?" Smith threatened. Jonathan was struggling in his restraints, using his free arm to try and punch his father. 

"Stop struggling, it'll be nice and slow. I'll start with...him!" Smith looks at Tyler with a wicked grin. He raises his arm and throws the knife at Tyler. It turns, blade over handle at lightning speed.

"No!" Craig screams, and jumps in front of Tyler. The blade lodges itself into Craig's left shoulder, just outside of the bulletproof vest. Craig sinks to the floor in a scream of pain. 

"Craig!" Tyler sinks to the floor with Craig, cradling him in his arms.

Brock and Brian raise baseball bats and charge at Smith. Smith draws a gun and shoots frantically. The bullet lodges itself in Brock's thigh, making Brock fall to the ground, loosing blood. Brian almost trips over him, but halts to help apply pressure to the wound.

"Everything's going to be fine, Brock," Brian whispers, but it was more for himself than Brock, who was perfectly calm. 

While Smith was distracted by laughing at the unfortunate two, Marcel snuck up behind him and hit him hard over the head with a bat. Smith's face when blank and he fell to the floor, landing face down. Lui and Nogla had raced up stairs to get the police, and Evan raced over to Jon. 

He cut away at the ropes, quickly freeing Jon. Before Evan could stop himself, he flung his arms around Jon, who hugged him despite the pain he was in. Evan pulls back when he hears Jon whimper a bit in pain. Evan meets Jonathan's eyes, and they're smiling. Jon pulls Evan towards him by his collar, and leans forward to press their lips together. Evan threads his fingers through Jon's hair as he kisses Jon back. They pull away and rest their foreheads together, smiling at each other.

Craig whoops, snapping them from their trance, then groans in pain. He's lying down in Tyler's lap, the two applying pressure around the knife. They haven't taken it out, or Craig would loose a lot more blood.

"Brock? Brock!" Brian whimpers, then shouts. He's still applying pressure to the wound, but Brock's head has lolled back and his eyes have slipped shut. 

"He's alright, he's passed out from shock rather than blood loss, we'll get both him and Craig into the ambulance," Bryce says. Bryce goes to help Brian carry Brock and Ryan goes to help Craig. Another man made his way down the stairs and over to Jon. 

"My name is officer Luke Patterson. We're going to take you to the hospital to get checked out, then we'll take you to the station to give your statements. We'll get your friends statements as well," Luke explains. Jon nods in agreement, and everyone makes there way upstairs. Luke puts handcuffs on Smith's unconscious body and takes him to the hospital in the police car. 

Evan and Jon sit in the back of one of the police cars, David and Lui are in the other one. Brian and Brock take the first ambulance and Tyler and Craig take the second one. They quickly arrive at the hospital and Craig, Brock, and Jon are admitted. Brock goes into surgery to get the bullet removed and Craig and Jon need stitches for their wounds. 

Evan feels his eyes slip shut as he passes out in his hospital chair.


	14. Chapter 14

Evan wakes slowly from his state of unconsciousness and found his arm jabbed with an iv drip. A nurse with a clipboard rushes into his room.

"Evan Fong?" She asks, Evan nods, "Good, you passed out after you had a panic attack, how are you feeling?"

"I'm feeling better, can I see Jon now?" Evan says, sitting up.

"Yeah, that's fine, let me just get this drip out of you," the nurse says. She takes the drip out of Evan's arm and writes something on the clipboard. Evan thanks her and rushes from the room.

David and Lui rise from their seats once they see Evan exit the room.

"Where is everyone? How long have I been out for?" Evan asks, looking back and forth in between the two men.

"You were only out for a couple of hours. Brock went into a surgery to get the bullet removed, and Craig got stitches for his shoulders. Jon got stitches for the wounds on his chest, and is just resting in room 317, just down the hall, next to Mini's room," Lui explains, pointing in the direction of the room. Evan flashes him a thumbs up and races to Jon's room.

When Evan enters the room, Jon is straightening his bed sheets, ready to leave the hospital. Jon meets Evan's eyes at the commotion, and freezes his actions. Evan clears his throat, and slowly approaches the smaller man. Evan rests his hand under Jon's chin, and tilts his head up. Jonathan's blue eyes sparkle and slip shut as Evan's soft lips meet his own. They smile through the kiss, and pull apart after a moment.

"What's the story?" Evan asks.

"What do you mean?" Jon queries, cocking his head.

"What is Jonathan Smith's story? Did Evan Fong manage to capture his heart?" Evan smiles, kissing Jon softly once more.

"I think he might have, actually," Jon laughs, and Evan chuckles quietly. Then the smile disappears from Evan's face.

"Why did you run from me on Monday? What were you afraid of?" Evan asks. Jonathan sighs, and shifts his gaze to the floor.

"When you realised that I'm Delirious, I thought you were going to be disappointed, or even disgusted. I was worried that you would realise that I was hopelessly in live with you, and that you were going to hate me for lying to you for months. I don't know why I didn't just tell you in the first place..." Jonathan explains grimly.

"Then that night I was so upset I didn't know where I was, and then my dad kidnapped me. My mum and I only moved up to Canada to escape him, yet there he was. He...he gave me these scars on my face for my tenth birthday, he gave me the scars on my back for every other day of the year. He gave me the ones on my torso over the past few days because I defied him. I was stronger than him for a while. And now he's gone for good, locked up, and I-," Jon chokes outs, before grinning helplessly.

"He's gone, Evan," Jon threw his arms around Evan's neck and hugged him tightly.

"You know I would never truly hurt you, Del. If only I could've ditched those toxic three earlier, then we wouldn't be in this situation," Evan kisses Jon's forehead, "Why did you cut?"

"I-I don't know, I felt so overwhelmed and my mind lost control. I hated myself afterwards, and I regretted it so much. It was a one time occurrence, I don't want to do it ever again," Jon says. They stay in their embrace for a while, before Evan pulls away and looks into Jon's glittering eyes. 

"Jonathan, would you like to go on a date with me sometime and be my boyfriend?" Evan asks, smiling widely. Jon nods and grins, before bringing his lips to Evan's. Marcel enters the room and immediately covers his eyes. 

"Jesus guys this is a hospital!" Marcel shouts, and Nogla and Lui run in after him.

"Yay, took you both long enough! We've been waiting for months for this!" Nogla cheers, and Lui claps. Jon quiets them and reminds them that it's a hospital and they should be quiet. Jon finishes gathering his things and they leave the room. As Jon checks out, Evan wanders to Craig's room, and suspects that Tyler will be in there as well. He opens the door and walks in, only to be struck by the vision of Tyler shoving his tongue down Craig's throat. Craig pushes Tyler away at the sound of the door opening, but both of their guilt-ridden, flushed faces give them away.

"How long has this been going on for?" Evan asks, still in shock.

"After the nurses left the room. I couldn't hold it back any longer. When Craig got hit, I was so scared, he could've bled to death for all we know. I decided to stop waiting for things to happen and make it happen myself," Tyler exclaims, and Craig rests his head on Tyler's shoulder. 

"Took your time, Craig has been pining over you for ages," Evan laughs, before waltzing out of the room, leaving the two to their business. Nogla, Jon, Lui, and Marcel caught up to Evan, and Evan explains the 'Minicat' situation.

Brian runs from around the corner to the group of men. 

"Brock is out of surgery! And I didn't know what to do so I kissed him! And he kissed back?! The nurses kicked me out though, they had to give him some meds, but still!" Brian shouts, and everyone congratulated him, but a nearby nurse shushes them group of men.

"Everyone's hooking up today, what is this? I saw those two officers from earlier attached at the lips," Marcel chuckles. 

"Wait a second? Is H2OVanoss and Minicat finally real as well?" Brian asks, his eyes darting between Evan and Jon, then looking over to Craig's room where the missing two were residing. Evan answers by entwining his fingers with Jon, and Lui shoves to two, calling them icky in his squeaker voice. 

***

Later that day, the group of men, now accompanied by Craig and Tyler enter Brock's room, and Brian rushes to the chair by his side.

"What's happened in the past few hours?" Brock asks, voice weak. 

"Jon's father was taken away, and will most likely be on trial soon, and H2OVanoss and Minicat are now canon. They have been inseparable all day. So...what about you and Brian?" Marcel explains, then winks suggestively. Brock blushes and looks over to Brian for comfort. 

"Fuck it why not, we're dating! Now the whole group can have a big, gay orgy," Brian laughs, throwing his hands up. 

***

In a couple of days, Brock is checked out and they head back to Evan's house. His parents are coming back from a business trip, so Evan and Jon drive the ragtag group up to the airport where they go their separate ways. Craig and Tyler head back to America, where Craig is going to live with Tyler. David, Lui, Brock and Brian go back to Ireland, where Brock is going to live with Brian and Lui is going to make his residence at Nogla's permanent. 

Now Jon and Evan have to survive the rest of the year and then they are free, but it looks like it's going to be a lot easier than they thought.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Wow, finally finished, this book has been a journey. Thanks for the support everyone, vote if you liked, comment if you want to. I'm currently writing up my new book over on Wattpad, Superheroes, which will not only be H2OVanoss, but the rest of the ships in the BBS too. Bye!


End file.
